Govt not consulted us on petrol price hike: Mamata

NEW DELHI: The increase in petrol prices have caused rumblings within the Congress-led UPA. The Trinamool Congress has said the government had not consulted it before prices were raised. Trinamool is the largest constituent of UPA after Congress.

"Our leader Mamata Banerjee met Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee last evening at the airport here, and even there the decision on hiking prices was not communicated to her," Trinamool Congress MP Sudip Bandopadhyay told reporters here on Sunday.

He said the Trinamool Congress was of the opinion that any such decision should be taken at a meeting of all UPA parties. "A meeting in three months should happen to discuss the ideas of different parties who are very much involved to run UPA," Bandopadhyay said.

The Trinamool Congress has reasons to be worried. With assembly elections in West Bengal due this summer, the political fallout of the Centre's move to increase petrol prices, particularly in times of food inflation, could hit its prospects in the polls. As elections near, Mamata Banerjee's party would find it increasingly difficult to justify decisions like increase in fuel prices.

Distancing itself from the decision, the Trinamool Congress is even planning protests in the state, where its arch rival, the Left, is all set to take to the streets against the move. CPM's trade union wing Citu has already announced a three-hour state-wide transport strike from Monday noon to protest against petrol price rise.

CPM polit bureau, which met in Kolkata over the weekend, has decided to launch an agitation against price rise in consultation with other Left and non-BJP Opposition parties. The Left is expected to capitalise on the fact that Trinamool Congress is a constituent of a government, which has been unable to contain food inflation and "added to the burden of the common man" by increasing fuel prices.

This is not the first time that the Trinamool Congress has expressed its reservations over increase in fuel prices. In February last year, the Trinamool Congress and DMK had made noises after the Union budget against the increase in fuel prices. However, allies were reined in ahead of an Opposition-sponsored cut motions to censure the Manmohan Singh government.

The government came under heavy shelling from BJP which alleged that the increase in prices of food and petrol was a "Congress conspiracy" against the common man.

"When the world is witnessing a stable price regime and food prices are actually going down in most parts, India is experiencing a turbulent price regime because of lack of a cohesive policy on part of the UPA," BJP spokesperson Prakash Javadekar told reporters. He said that in the name of de-control, it was the cartel of oil companies which was raising the prices under government protection.